Meet Filipino contemporary artist, Aze Ong.
Tell us a little bit about yourself.
I am Aze Ong, a contemporary artist working with fiber. My art practice is about using fiber as a medium which includes history, culture and my ecology around it. I remember growing up being exposed to fabric, thread and sewing machines when my mom pursued her love for clothes starting out in our garage. I would play &#;bahay bahayan&#; (playing house) with our seamstress&#; daughter using excess fabrics, umbrellas, threads and imagine them as walls, food, bed, curtains, anything that plays in the mind. My mom involved me in her garments business sewing buttons onto summer dresses and blouse and skirts she designed paying me 5 cents per button sewed. I called the process of locking the stitches of a button &#;around the world&#; as it creates a circular movement while knotting. Little did I know that these experiences will shape my future and lead to a journey in the world of art.
I am currently working on an experiential performance entitled Queen. The project started in New York during my residency at the Bliss on Bliss Art Projects where I initially wanted to explore on public art.
Art Fair Featured Artist Aze Ong on Weaving the Threads of Life
When she was in New York, she befriended another Japanese conceptual artist, Fuyuka Shindo, who is also an ACC grantee. Shindo said to her that her works do not have context but are process-oriented. "She made a very good statement though," Ong says. "She said that our cultural traditions should be written in a book or books so we do not forget, and we can always go back and research."
For Ong, preserving heritage by continuing what may be applicable from the past and adjusting it for the purpose of development is necessary for protecting our weaving traditions. "Our Indigenous Peoples' weaving are the stories of our ancestors. It may be passed on to generations, but there may be problems with the next generation. [Hence] it would be ideal to learn the skills and knowledge of the past and recreate it connected to the current times. The next generations should be able to tell their own stories and experiences connected to the present," Ong advises.
Another point she raises is the expensive price of local fibres and inaccessibility to the public. "If we are able to use our woven works in our everyday life, [perha
Aze Ong weaves a tale of pain & transcendence
Art sometimes is not a lovely stroll into sunlit meadows with a canvas and a set of paints to render nature’s own profile pic. Art can be painful, bone-twisting, leaving a trail of gnarled fingers and frayed feelings.
Aze Ong—throughout the course of her practice focused on fiber as a medium (crocheting, sewing, knitting, knotting, weaving art pieces)—developed chronic pain in her hands, wrist, and arm due to repetitive motion and pushing her body to the limit. Numbing at first, then a web of excruciating pain ensues. Birthing those monumental, organic-looking, tentacled weaves was becoming quite an ordeal for the artist: the spirit remains willing, but the fingers are signifying surrender.
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For her Transcendence piece for this year’s Art Fair Philippines Projects at Ayala Triangle Garden, Aze was undaunted: she wanted to create something bigger than her work titled My Soul’s Light.
“(My intention was) to create an epic piece of art despite the physical and psychological challenge
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"So can the notion of concept be forced into the work? How can reflexivity be imbricated in this kind of initiation?
First, Ong keeps to task with devotion, almost obsessively crocheting to give birth to works beyond human scale and to fill cavernous white cubes with her ever efflorescent forms
Second, Ong explores the potential of her body to perform
Third, Ong collects everyday things that she picks up in her sojourns and weaves them into her work.
the fiber art of Ong enlivens the space because it bears a multitude of materials; and it shelters the body because it evokes the hyperbolic world. This is an exemplary convergence: the body dwells in strands of memory, taken on like habit with wistfulness and defiance.
- Patrick D. Flores, Ph.D.
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